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Thursday, 5 July 2012

A Fairy Tale from the Daily Fail

Once upon a time there was a handsome prince. He met a fair maid and married her with much pomp and ceremony at Westminster Abbey. The whole nation rejoiced (especially at the sight of the fair maid's sister's rather captivating posterior) and the two of them lived happily ever (the prince and fair maid, that is, not her sister's glutei maximi). The prince went back to driving helicopters and the princess smiled prettily and captivated almost everybody.

Except, that is, for one man. His name was Paul and he hated to see other people living happily ever after, especially if their parents did rather well out of it. In fact, he was really rather beastly to the fair maid's mum in particular, never ceasing to have a dig or two about her former career ('It's a long way from 'doors to manual' for Mrs Middleton') and criticising her for selling 'gaudy Diamond Jubilee memorabilia' on her website.

Even the way she laughed came in for criticism. 'At Ascot,' he wrote, 'Carole, 55, felt sufficiently at ease to bray with laughter at one of Philip’s jokes as they watched racegoers from the royal box - even if such a raucous laugh was the sort of thing that would have raised eyebrows at Downton Abbey.'

Now in the same country there was a humble blogger who from time to time wrote things about aspects of the Royal Family he found puzzling. A few people read his stuff and now and then people added comments, which he liked.

But such was the zeal with which Scott of The Mail pursued the fair maid's mum that he seized upon these 'puerile witterings', describing one piece as 'an excoriating diatribe' and claiming that - as it was 'prominently displayed on the Middletons’ website' - it might imply their 'tacit approval' of this bloggers 'vehemently anti-monarchist' thesis.

That's the fairy story, anyway.

The reality, such as it is, is rather more mundane but in the interests of putting a few things straight (and in case Paul Scott is reading) here are the facts:

Far from 'penning a regular blog for The Party Times' or 'publishing an entry on The Party Times page' I write this blog, here, and publish it on my page. No 'inflammatory articles' of mine 'appear on the Party Times website'; they are merely linked via that 'tackily titled' blogroll you keep mentioning. That's how blogs work, Paul.

As you rightly say, I'm a former teacher. And old habits of correcting ignorance wherever I find it die hard.

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